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It was seven minutes before the war council was due to begin, and Felix ambled into the long meeting room. He brushed corvid-blue hair to angle across his face and fall in layers over pale cheekbones that were still rubbed red from the blustering mountain wind.
Byleth could feel the war chamber evaporating around her. For a moment, she could imagine herself in a brighter, softer space, as Felix’s hand dropped from his hips and he sat catty-cornered from her.
Did everyone experience the way that space seemed to warp when Felix walked into a room? Or was it just Byleth feeling hollowed out until she could hear her breathing, like echoes thrown against the pearlescent walls of a conch shell? She measured her breath while watching him adjust his seat.
Felix was the fastidious sort—he washed behind his ears, used soap in his hair, scrubbed stains from his cape—but he was never early. Even being on time showed too much interest. And Felix was always expectant, never interested.
Byleth sighed.
She twitched a pearl-inlaid reading lantern between her hands and pretended that he wasn’t looking at her from under his lashes, fingers drifting toward his sword hilt as if seeking out a talisman.
In the bay of Fraldarius, Byleth remembered, divers held their breath for up to seven minutes searching for pearls. She wondered if Felix ever went diving. She imagined him taking a brave leap off a pitted cliffside, cutting the water with his hands as he propelled downward, holding all that pressure in his lungs.
He shifted his attention across the paneled walls. His eyes roved a map of Faerghus in the middle of the conference table, before finally checking out Byleth’s hands. Her tapered fingers were vulnerable against the ornamental lantern. How rare to see them not holding weapons of bone and steel.
“You’re early,” she said when she couldn’t hold her breath any longer.
“I had nothing better to do.” He was still watching her hands under those lowered lashes. “Ingrid was hounding the cooks for food.”
“Provision shortages in Galatea are hitting a critical point, aren’t they?”
Felix nodded and continued to list his grievances:
“Sylvain was sucking face with some nondescript NPC in the gazebo courtyard.”
“It’s always annoying when he does that. He could at least choose a named character. It would make it easier to gossip.”
Felix pinched the corners of his eyes. “Dimitri built a campfire in the chapel, and now he’s reciting Hamlet to the ghosts.” His voice grew low and ragged. “As if he wants to teach them how to haunt him better.”
“I’ve been a little concerned about his behavior…”
“So that brings me here. You’re the only thing that makes any sense in this place—”
“I…” Byleth gulped. Lungs underwater, breath stalled out.
“—And that’s saying a lot,” Felix continued, “considering you slept for five years during a brutal war and only woke up because you were convinced there would be a party.”
Byleth’s hands fluttered around the lantern like someone grasping to find the surface of a deep pool. Felix had said she was the only thing that made sense. Felix might… not hate her?
“I see how that comes off as somewhat strange.” She pushed the lantern away, but the nerves remained fixed in her hands. “I hope that doesn’t make you mad.”
Felix’s gaze snapped up: It hadn’t occurred to him to be mad. “After five years out of commission, it’s good to have you back as a sparring partner.”
Byleth tracked a stray lock of hair that had fallen from Felix’s ponytail. Without thinking, she leaned to the table corner and touched the hair where it trickled down his neck. It whispered silkily between her fingers as she tucked it behind his ear.
The way his eyes widened made her head spin.
“Profes—Byleth, what the fuck?”
They had touched each other before: callouses on callouses. A palm offered to pick him back up after sending his ass into the dirt each time she bested him.
He visibly swallowed. Slowly, his adam’s apple moved up and then down. Her hand trailed from behind his ear. It traveled down to his jaw.
He leaned his head forward. He didn’t know what he wanted. He simply knew that he was available.
A straight shot would connect their lips, hit rate 100%.
Byleth held her breath, her mouth ghosted forward.
Panic!
Her eyes snapped onto Felix’s face.
Utter panic! lungs collapsing in the bay of Fraldarius—
Byleth turned back the hands of time.
Felix leaned in for a kiss.
Byleth touched Felix’s hair.
Felix talked.
Byleth talked.
Felix talked.
Byleth talked.
Felix talked.
Byleth talked.
Felix talked.
Byleth talked.
Felix peered around awkwardly.
Byleth sighed.
Felix entered the war chamber.
Divine Pulse has 7 charges remaining.
— — —
What in the name of Saint Seiros’s ancient perky tits just happened?
If Byleth had a heartrate it would be wilding. She had almost kissed Felix! In her mind’s eye, she watched herself zoom in on Felix’s face again and again on a loop, until her perspective lingered there with her lips a breath from his.
It was seven minutes until the war council was due to begin, and Felix interrupted Byleth’s reverie by stalking into the long meeting room. Seeing that Byleth was already blushing pink from the roots of her hair down to her chin, he chose to sit a few chairs away from her, disengaged and suspiciously watching.
Not only had she almost kissed Felix, but he had leaned into it—like he wanted to be kissed?
The room itself seemed to be holding its breath, waiting for Byleth to say something:
“So cats, huh?”
“What about them?”
“They’re,” she gulped “cute.” Her gigantic green eyes pinned Felix to his seat.
He looked away scornfully.
He was used to this from her. Whenever she bullied him into taking tea, she would run through small-talk topics the way an actor reads off cue cards.
“They’re everywhere since I returned,” she said. Felix shrugged, unsurprised. Everyone knows cats love to sit on ruins. “But, I think, they’ve been skittish of me?”
Byleth miscalculated Felix’s ability to read the subtext in her small talk. Perhaps his Charm stat was too low.
Byleth might have been subtly commenting that:
a) Felix seemed to be everywhere she was lately, and
b) it was making her head feel a little funny, and
c) maybe Felix was being purposefully skittish of her, and
d) if Felix was being skittish of her, did it have something to do with him leaning in for her kiss?
Nonetheless, Felix's practical mind managed to distill all this into one overarching question: how do I get cats to like me?
“They go crazy for white trout,” he said finally. “Loach too. The other day, I fed one a Loach and it coughed up a crystal.”
Byleth nodded sensibly: puking arcane crystals was a very cat thing to do. “Where did you get the fish?”
“The pond.”
“You caught it?”
“Obviously.”
“With a rod?”
“No,” Felix squinted at her. “I stuck my sword in the water, and the fish gutted itself on my blade.”
“Right,” Byleth muttered.
A sword? Interesting. Why had she never thought to try that?
This was her chance, she thought, to ask him if he ever went diving.
Yet, suddenly, a strange expression claimed his face. It was the look of a mercenary who's eaten too many wild-berries; they always grimaced like this right before they launched the contents of their stomach into the bushes.
Felix parted his lips.
Byleth’s eyes widened. Was Felix really choosing to vomit right before war council? Had he eaten a bad fish with the cats? In horror, she watched hot breath rush from his mouth—
He cackled.
Heh-heh, heh-heh-heh.
Felix was laughing.
There was no vomit. No stomach juices poured out on the council table. Just her best swordsman mocking her.
He covered his mouth with a scarred hand, still puffing out gasps of laughter “Of course I caught them with a rod. I know how to fish.” He shook his head haughtily. “Faerghus nobility grow up knowing how to survive—”
Byleth’s face scrunched, and Felix stopped talking immediately.
He watched her eyes narrow, target-locked: she was going to attack him.
She may not have had a weapon, but even her hands were deadly. Maybe, he shouldn’t have laughed at her. Felix gulped, grounded his feet, ready to spring up and fight.
Then, Byleth panted out a breath and with it came, “Hah.”
“Profes—Byleth?”
Another hyperventilating intake. Another breath panted out. HAh. HAH hah.
The Ashen Demon was laughing.
Felix had never seen her with such poor breathing control. Normally, she was the one schooling him about when to breathe: inhale through the nose during muscular exertion, exhale through the mouth with the jab.
Now Byleth was trying to laugh, squeaking breath in and out like a leaky bellows. “Hah hah hah heh-ha.”
“Byleth?” Felix’s face—alarmed? amused? affectionately concerned?—swam before her teary eyes. “Try to breathe. You’re going to pass out if you keep it up.”
Byleth couldn’t! She couldn’t breathe. Her world was constricting, and she was feeling that drowning sensation again. Her eyesight grew dim.
As she slumped to the floor, Felix ran to catch her just before her head hit the ground.
Cradling her head in one hand, he reached out two fingers to feel for her carotid artery. There was no pulse!
Panicking, he brought his ear to Byleth’s mouth to check for breath sounds.
The voices of Sylvain and Ingrid came through the doorway: “…I mentioned the war council but he wouldn’t listen. He just went on about that time I borrowed Glenn’s whetstone and never gave it back.”
“I got the same treatment,” came Ingrid’s weary voice. “I urged him to meet with Professor Byleth, but then he hollered at me to go away. He accused me of never laughing at Glenn’s jokes enough. You’d think if ghosts were going to haunt a man to madness, they’d have better things to complain about—”
In a creak of training armor, the two rounded into the room. They saw Felix kneeling over Byleth. One hand gently supported her head, while her lips were pressed to his ear.
“What in the name of Nemesis’s gray-haired nutsack is going on?!” Sylvain cursed.
“Felix! What happened to the Professor?” Ingrid shouted.
“She hyperventilated,” Felix grunted.
It wasn’t him! He didn’t kill Byleth. It wasn’t his fault if she died laughing.
For a split-second, her lips moved. Her breath warmed and tickled his ear. A hot blush burned across his cheeks and—
Byleth turned back the hands of time.
Byleth mumbled.
Ingrid and Sylvain entered.
Ingrid talked.
Sylvain talked.
Felix caught Byleth mid-fall.
Byleth was vanquished by laughter.
Felix laughed.
Byleth talked.
Felix talked.
Byleth mentioned cats.
Felix entered the war chamber.
Divine Pulse has 6 charges remaining.
— — —
He didn’t know. None of them knew that she lacked a pulse, that she could change the course of fate.
People fought dirty in the war council room. A single glance could be a hidden dagger or a love letter. Play the game and find out which.
Byleth preferred the training grounds. If you disagreed with someone, you could beat the shit out of them. Who has got the time for a battle of wills? She’s appalled you’d even ask her.
That’s why she cheated. And if she altered fate to get her way, that guilt was between herself and the Goddess.
It was seven minutes until the war council, and Byleth was already standing when Felix ambled his way in. Pretty face, pretty hair—white and teal and earthy-brown all very windswept together. Her attraction to him was immediate this time. And he wasn’t looking displeased to see her either.
She was finally realizing what this was all about.
“I’m glad you’re here.” Byleth put all the training from her S+ ranking in Authority into her words as she crossed to him. “The goddess requires a favor of you.”
She was going to do this, just fucking go for it. She was going to make him make her happy.
She cupped his chin and notched her nose against his.
When she leaned in, his lips were thin and unresponsive, and he shrank away from her.
The kiss was a flatline: inert, unyielding, dry, and chapped. Like kissing a butter knife from the everyday set of Fraldarius flatware—the set without the curved handles and ornamental pearl inlays.
Felix hissed, squinted, jerked back. He angrily clawed Byleth’s hand from his face.
“Is this why you always insist that I come on time? So you can extort me into kissing you? You creep.”
Felix was looking at her like he had never truly seen her before in his life.
Byleth’s face crumpled. Her inner Sothis mocked: You can’t order someone to love you. It has to happen naturally.
Byleth began stammering an apology, but Felix had already turned on his heels to sprint from the room—
Byleth turned back the hands of time.
Felix escaped from battle.
Byleth cried awkward apologies.
Felix yelled.
Byleth seized Felix’s lips.
Felix entered the war chamber.
Byleth rallied Charm.
Divine Pulse has 5 charges remaining.
— — —
It was seven minutes until the war council meeting. Byleth was resting her chin in her palm and looking down at the large map of the Kingdom territories.
Her eyes traced the Bay of Fraldarius. Austere with cliffs and scrubby evergreens. It was also known for its luxury exports: cashmere, salt-water pearls, and emeralds mined from the shale of volcanic grottoes long extinct.
“You look deep in thought. Do you have a complicated strategy planned?” Felix asked as he walked in and casually took the seat next to her.
She looked up at him, giant garden eyes guarded and still contrite from their last seven minutes. What were the odds she would say the wrong thing again?
You have a 43% chance of fucking this up, her inner Sothis supplied unhelpfully. Stay vigilant. Byleth sighed. She turned her quill over in her hands, and said the first thing that came to mind:
“Do you recall that time you told me you would be more comfortable holding a sword than a woman’s hand?”
He raised his eyebrows. “Did I say that? It’s a good turn of phrase.” He smirked self-indulgently. “I also complimented you as a sparring partner.”
“You told me not to get sick. It was harsh.”
“Well,” he looked at the end of her quill which was unconsciously circling the Fraldarius territory. “I don’t feel that way now. You are a good sparring partner. If I could do it again…”
Her gaze snapped upward to his while he continued watching her make invisible outlines on the map.
“It’s pointless to even think about that,” he said. “It’s impossible to go back in time.”
“Yeah,” Byleth gulped. Her hand stilled. “Totally impossible. People who want to go back to the past are fools.”
“I agree, how foolish to dwell on regrets.” He looked sideways at her. Then, rearranged his bangs as his gaze shifted away. “I did have regrets, you know. When you fell. I wished I could go back and save you. Sylvain tried to tell me in those years that it was just a phase, that I’d get over it.”
“Get over what?”
Felix glared at the map with all the gravity of a cat about to spit up an arcane crystal. “Get over you.”
Byleth yelped. She looked over to find Felix’s intense, frustrated eyes drilling into her. It was too much. Before she realized—
Byleth turned back the hands of time.
Byleth disengaged from battle.
Byleth took 35 damage.
Felix used Finesse Blade.
Felix entered the war chamber.
Divine Pulse has 4 charges remaining.
— — —
As soon as Felix shadowed the doorframe of the war chamber, Byleth rose from her chair. The determined look of a critical hit burned hot in her eyes.
She crossed to him, ignoring the question halfway out of his mouth.
He felt his pulse leap as she grabbed the fur of his cloak and threw him against the wall. It was more than a sneak attack; it was a bombardment, pushing him on unsteady feet.
The leather armor on his shoulders slapped against the hard stone. He hissed. His eyes traced between her arms. Arousal sparked. He let his eyes flicked down her neck, across her chest. His pants were feeling uncomfortably tight.
She leaned in and claimed his lips. Hard, frustrated kisses that sent his head rocking back against the wall.
He grabbed her hips. Bit her until she bit back.
She relinquished his shoulder, pried a hand from her hip, wrapped her fingers around his wrist, and pinned it against the wall above his head.
As she continued to surge up closer, her medallion caught on the silver fastenings of his armor. With the hand that wasn’t pinned, he pulled the medallion. The tug on her neck made her breath short until she was panting even closer to him.
Her free hand grabbed his pony-tail, mussing the deliberate layers of his hair, to feel his goddess-blessed vanity like feathers under her fingers.
She had been right: he really could hold his breath for a long time.
Deep kisses hollowed their cheeks. She wondered at what point diving into Felix would create a pressure change, make her ears pop, make her lungs sore as their oxygen expanded. She wondered if he could kiss her for all seven minutes without coming up for air.
His fingers flexed and jerked her hips closer. Byleth could almost hear Sothis’s pert commentary in her head: having a little fun, are we?
She was grinding between his legs when Sylvain and Ingrid’s complaining voices came through the doorway: “…Apparently being tortured by ghosts means hearing them nag about little offenses from ten years ago.”
Time’s up, cautioned her inner Sothis.
Byleth jerked back but Felix was holding her tight. “Closer,” he growled. Powerless, Byleth fell back into his depths and let him steal her breath.
As Sylvain and Ingrid rounded into the room, they witnessed the struggle. Byleth’s vice-like grip pinning Felix’s wrist to the wall; Felix’s tongue down Byleth’s throat.
She looked up into his eyes, spared a moment to read the question there: what is this?
Sylvain whistled. “Holy Saint Chicol’s impressively long spear—”
Byleth turned back the hands of time.
Sylvain entered the war chamber.
Ingrid entered the war chamber.
Felix pulled Byleth closer.
Byleth pushed away from Felix.
Sylvain spoke.
Felix kissed Byleth back.
Byleth kissed Felix.
Felix grabbed Byleth.
Byleth threw Felix against the wall.
Felix entered the war chamber.
Divine Pulse has 3 charges remaining.
— — —
The memory of the last seven minutes still burned hot on Byleth’s lips. What in the name of the Saint Cethleann’s high-as-a-kite vacant stare had possessed her to manhandle Felix into a vicious makeout? And he had enjoyed it?
“Felix,” she popped her head up as he entered the war chamber.
Her slow blush was already beginning on her forehead.
“Five years ago, you said that you weren’t suited for passionate romances. Things can change a lot in five years, though, can’t they? I mean, have you ever kissed someone?”
She could feel her inner Sothis cringing.
Felix gave her a look like she had just scalped his favorite cat. He had barely made it a few feet into the room before turning on his heels and leaving.
Byleth buried her head in her hands—
Byleth turned back the hands of time.
Felix left the war chamber.
Byleth made it weird.
Felix entered the war chamber.
Divine Pulse has 2 charges remaining.
— — —
Byleth twitched her pen against the map of Faerghus on the conference table: This is awkward.
Felix shifted: This is so awkward.
Byleth snapped the pen down: You could try saying something.
Felix pulled a textbook of reason magic from his bag. Clearly, reading subject material (which he allegedly hated) was a preferred hell to awkward silence with Byleth.
Byleth pulled out a book of her own.
Felix looked at her over the top of his book, then ducked down before she caught him.
Byleth openly stared at Felix.
He slammed his book on the table.
“I….”
For a split second the routine of a passionate affair ran through Byleth’s mind: He would be the Duke of Fraldarius, she the Archbishop of the Church of Seiros. They would meet with a clash of blades, slow acrobatics that would gradually accelerate with each slug of the sword, until his hand would find itself in her hair, and her kissing would find its way to his mouth.
He would hoard her in his quarters, where they would barricade themselves away from responsibilities for as long as possible. They’d drink cinnamon spice tea and make fun of the old chivalric tales that kept Faerghus tied up in bonds. Every breath would conspire some distant future when they would run off and become mercenaries together, just abandon everything and go.
“I…” she tried again, but the words wouldn’t come—
Byleth turned back the hands of time.
Byleth was Silenced.
Felix held his ground.
Byleth waited.
Felix entered the war chamber.
Divine Pulse has 1 charge remaining.
— — —
Coward, Byleth cursed herself, coward!
Every time Felix walked into the room fresh, it became harder and harder for her to breathe. As he sat near her at the conference table, she shook her head, like she was shaking water from her hair. She gulped to clear the pressure imbalance between her ears.
She looked up at him: “Are we into each other?”
“Why?” He asked defensively. “Who have you been talking to?” He didn’t even give Byleth time to answer before ranting, “Is it Sylvain? Sylvain is full of shit! You should know that just because he says that I have a crush on you doesn’t mean it’s true. All he thinks about is—”
“No, I’ve only been talking to you.” Many versions of you. So many versions of you.
“Then why would you think that?” His fingers tucked at his bangs. He pinched his jaw. Acutely aware of giving himself away just a moment ago.
She nodded and tried to present this as a very straightforward matter. Quite the bluff on her part. “You’re a skilled fighter.”
“You’re a skilled fighter too.”
“Maybe two people who fight as well as we do would be good at other things. Physical things… Things that aren’t necessarily fighting but are somewhat tangential to fighting—maybe we would be good at that too.”
“We could try…”
“There’s only one way to get good at it…”
“Training. Yes, I agree…”
And before they could spare any more halting words, Felix had Byleth pinned against the table.
His kisses fought dirty, and Byleth was their victim. He bit her tongue and then sucked on it. She held his face, felt the hard structure of his high cheekbones jutting out over the hollowed cheeks. He cradled the back of her neck. His mouth trailed down her collar to the place where her pulse should have been; he bit down.
“Someone’s coming,” Byleth hissed before they could even hear Ingrid and Sylvain.
Felix’s hair was disheveled; Byleth’s armor wasn’t straight. But at least this time she had the foresight to slam Felix down into his seat. She flopped into her own, right as they heard Sylvain and Ingrid talking through the doorway.
Felix looked in the opposite direction from Byleth. Byleth was looking as far from Fraldarius territory on the map as one could get.
And they thought they had gotten away with it.
Sylvain and Ingrid entered without incident and settled into their chairs. “Wow, Professor—I mean Byleth. Did you know you have a bite mark the size of a wyvern egg on your neck?”
“Sylvain, that’s rude. How could she not know?” Ingrid said, her impeccable logic speeding ahead of her contextual understanding. Then, Ingrid’s eyes flicked between Felix and Byleth: oh… ohhhhh. No way. Oh wow, no way.
Byleth’s hand flung to cover the stinging red welt on her neck. Still refusing to look in her direction, Felix blushed brighter than the sunset over the Bay of Fraldarius.
“Sothis’s emotionally confusing belly-dancing! You two did it, didn’t you? See Ingrid I told you! I told—”
Byleth turned back the hands of time.
Sylvain talked.
Ingrid talked.
Sylvain entered the war chamber.
Ingrid entered the war chamber.
Byleth Shoved Felix.
Felix grappled Byleth.
Byleth talked.
Felix talked.
Byleth talked.
Felix entered the war chamber.
Byleth rallied Resilience.
Divine Pulse has 0 charges remaining.
— — —
It was seven minutes before the war council was due to begin, and Felix ambled into the long meeting room. He brushed corvid-blue hair to angle across his face and fall in layers over pale cheekbones that were still rubbed red from the blustering mountain wind.
Byleth pulled herself to attention like she had dived down long and deep into the salty bay and was just then coming up for air. She blinked her eyes, took Felix in: blue, teal, golden-browned and off-white, the colors reflected in the surface of a pearl.
Felix’s hand dropped from his hip. He sat down catty-cornered from her.
“I saw that sword technique you were practicing in the training hall last night,” she began. Every word was an invitation to share the great secret she had discovered, the secret that they both knew and didn’t know how to say. “It looks very powerful.”
Felix nodded smugly, “I bet it could best even you.”
“I’d like that.” His eyes snapped up at her. “I mean, I like seeing you get better, and therefore if you have a technique that you can use to surpass me, then I’d be… proud of you.”
“Proud of me?”
“And impressed.”
“Now you’re buttering me up.”
“I’d like a full demonstration of that technique.”
“Gladly.” For a moment he seemed lost in thought, staring at the map of Faerghus. “You like watching me train, don’t you?”
There was a cunning look in his eyes. The expression of someone who had been teased all their life, someone who had learned to use those techniques to tease someone else. His gaze was excruciating, a constant tickle right where it hurt.
“The feeling is mutual,” he went on. “I never get tired of seeing you in action.”
“How about this evening? I’d, um, love to demonstrate a few of my own techniques.”
Felix nodded, blushed slightly. The corners of his mouth tipped up, just as they heard the voices of Sylvain and Ingrid come through the doorway.